J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

This study relates to Turner’s 1836 tour of the Alps, which he made in the company of the wealthy Scottish landowner H.A.J. Munro of Novar; for more information, see the Introduction to this section.

Turner and Munro seem to have spent at least a couple of days in Chamonix, a French town near the Italian and Swiss borders at the foot of Mont Blanc. The spiky peaks in the upper right of this sheet are recognisable as from the Mont Blanc massif on the north side of the valley, with the Aiguille du Dru clearly shown. While Turner recorded nearer views of this peak during his 1802 tour of the area, when he ventured up to higher ground to see the Mer de Glace close up (see, for example, Tate D04613; Turner Bequest LXXV 21), here he shows the peak as part of a wider, and less obviously dramatic, vista. D34282 (Turner Bequest CCCXLII 83) is a related, although different, viewpoint.

For information about other studies made in and around Chamonix during the 1836 tour, see the entry for D34289 (Turner Bequest CCCXLII 84).

Verso:

Blank, save for inscriptions: inscribed in pencil ‘AB24PO’ bottom right.